1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a weather strip of the pile type in which a plurality of fibers are carried by a base strip and a windbreak is formed among the fibers by bonding selected fiber portions together.
2. Prior Art
Weather strips of the pile type having a pile material which runs longitudinally of a base strip are known. The base strip is utilized to support the pile material and may be secured in a channel formed in a wood, metal, or plastic support structure to support the pile material in an attitude projecting outwardly from a surface of the supporting structure.
The base strip is typically formed from woven fabric, plastic or metal. The upstanding fibrous pile material is either woven or stitched into the base strip or is provided as a flocking adhesively secured to the base strip. Weather strip structures of this type are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,002,253; 3,224,047; 3,616,137; 3,836,421; and 3,935,043.
Another type of proposed weather strip material incorporates a flexible, impermeable plastic sheet material in the center of or along an edge of the pile material in order to support the upstanding fibers and to provide a wind, water, and vapor barrier inside or immediately adjacent the pile material. Typical disclosures of this type are found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,175,256; 3,266,190; 3,404,487, and 3,745,053.
While it is desirable to include a windbreak among the fibers of the pile material, previous proposals for including various types of barriers on pile type weather strips have required that a material forming the barrier be separately positioned among or alongside the fibers and properly secured in place. These additional fabrication steps have added undesirably to the cost and difficulty of manufacturing weather strips.